Author: Keith Dsouza

Microsoft signed off the Windows 8 RTM yesterday with the retail version coming out on October 26th. Microsoft will also make the RTM available to developers and IT professional on August 15th and to other Microsoft customers starting August 16th. However, it looks like the Windows 8 RTM has already leaked into the wild.

Tom Warren from The Verge reports that the final edition of Windows 8 has already leaked into the wild. The leaked Windows 8 Enterprise edition is reportedly the European version of the software (Windows 8 ‘N’) which usually comes without the Windows Media Player installed in it.

The leaked version of Windows 8 is available for downloads on several fire sharing websites like Media Fire and is also easily searchable on sites like Files Tube. However, unlike all other recent Windows versions, the leaked version will not have all the features available unless you activate it and the earlier Windows 8 product keys will not work to activate the software.

A new celebrity death hoax is spreading on Facebook with famous actor Denzel Washington being made the victim this time. The message is being spread through the same satire website which were behind the rumors of deaths of Arnold Schwarzenegger, Keanu Reeves and Mickey Rourke.

The story is being spread through a link which leads to the Media Fetcher website and carries the following report:

Actor Denzel Washington is reported to have died shortly after a snowboard accident earlier today – August 2, 2012.

The actor & novice snowboarder was vacationing at the Zermatt ski resort in Zermatt, Switzerland with family and friends. Witnesses indicate that Denzel Washington lost control of his snowboard and struck a tree at a high rate of speed.

Denzel Washington was air lifted by ski patrol teams to a local hospital, however, it is believed that the actor died instantly from the impact of the crash. The actor was wearing a helmet at the time of the accident and drugs and alcohol do not appear to have played any part in his death.

Additional details and information will be updated as it becomes available. This story is still developing

Please note that this story is not true and is a hoax. Media Fetcher is a satire website which allows users to create fake news items and spread it on the internet. The site looks similar to a news website which is why several users are fooled into sharing the story further.

If you live(d) in the U.S. you might have used or heard about Craigslist at some point of time. Craigslist is an online classified website which lets you sell or buy almost anything. It is a service which has been useful in finding used furniture, house for rent and more.

However, Craigslist is very simple as is and does not provide users with an intuitive interface that we are used to in several other services on the Internet, specially when it comes to apartment hunting. Previously, one of my favorite service, which I have used several times to find housing; PadMapper, used to provide a interface to map Craigslist house listings on a map. Unfortunately, Craigslist sent them a cease and desist to stop using data from the website.

While that in itself led several users to revolt at Craigslist, the revolt led to nothing and Padmapper will no longer show Craigslist listing on their site. Nevertheless, Craigslist is still useful for finding apartments and if you are a Padmapper user or are looking to view Craigslist listing on a map, you can use a simple Chrome listing which does something similar.

Once you install the extension, you will be able to view all the apartments on an adjoining map as seen in the screenshot above. Clicking on the map will take you to the original Craigslist listing. This is definitely a useful PadMapper alternative because it allows you to only view apartments in a particular area and not browse through everything.

One thing I noticed that this extension does not work in all cities right now. For example, it does not work for New York. However, it does work for other cities/states like New Jersey and Phoenix.

I have been a Windows user for probably all my life, but started using Mac a few years ago. While I never required to use an external mouse with my Mac earlier on, I did find the need for one when I started using the Mac for longer periods.

On Windows, a mouse with a scroller will scroll the page in the direction the mouse wheel is scrolled, for example; the page will scroll down when you scroll the mouse wheel downwards and vice versa. However, Apple uses something called as natural scrolling direction and scrolls the page in the opposite direction.

If you are someone who is annoyed because of this strange scrolling behavior on a Mac, you can change the settings to make the page scroll in the direction you scroll the mouse wheel in.

To make that change, head over to System Preferences -> Mice and then uncheck the box next to “Move content in the direction of finger movement when scrolling or navigating” (In older Mac OS X versions, this would be the checkbox next to “Natural” scrolling”.

Once you uncheck the box, the page will scroll in the direction of the mouse wheel and not the opposite direction.

If you are a developer who works on integrating payment gateways into websites, you might have had to use dummy credit card information for testing purposes. While getting valid credit card numbers for testing is not that hard, a new website aims to make it far more easier to test your payment gateway integration.

Get Credit Card Numbers is a service which generates valid credit card numbers for testing purposes. Users can visit the site and get credit card numbers for Visa, Mastercard, Discover and American Express.

The website automatically generates a random set of credit card numbers when you visit the site. However, it also provides options to generate valid numbers in JSON, XML and CSV formats as well for individual card types.

If you are a developer who works on payment related modules, this website is definitely something you should bookmark.

Please note that the credit card numbers generated are “not real” and cannot be used to make purchases on the internet.

In the past, we have told you about several tools which allow you to check the backlinks to your websites. However, Google has also been providing with a similar feature to check for links to your website in Google Webmaster. The problem with the Google Webmaster Tools product was that it did not show you the dates for those links and you had to figure them out yourself.

Earlier today, Matt Cutts tweeted about a new feature in Google Webmasters which would allow you to download the most recent links to your website as a CSV or also view it directly in Google Docs.

The new addition allows a webmaster to view the most recent backlinks to their website as seen by Google. The CSV file contains the URL of the webpage which linked to you along with the date Google found the backlink on. This feature is definitely very useful since it will allow you to figure out who is linking to you from Google itself and not have to rely on external tools.

If you want to download a report of the most recent backlinks to your website, you can visit Google Webmaster Tools and click on the website you want to download it for. Once on the website dashboard, expand the “Traffic” menu item and click on the “Links to Your Site” link.

On that page, you will find two options. The first is “Who links the most” and the second is “Your most linked content”. You can click on the “More >>” link at the bottom of those sections to open any of those options. Once on the inside page, you will find a button to “Download latest links”. Click on the button to download a CSV file or to store the report to your Google Drive.

As a webmaster, I find this feature very useful and reliable because it is coming from none other than Google. What do you think about this new feature? Do you think it will be beneficial to you? What other features would you like to see built into Google Webmaster Tools? Do share your thoughts with me.

While Office 2013 can work simultaneously with earlier versions of Office including Office 2010, there might be reasons where you might want to uninstall it. Uninstalling Office 2013 is pretty simple, however, with Office 2013, Microsoft introduced a new feature where they restrict a single install to 5 computers. So you will also have to deactivate a PC online when you uninstall Office 2013 from your PC.

The first step in uninstalling Office 2013 is to go to https://officepreview.microsoft.com/en-us/MyAccount.aspx (this link will change for future versions) and sign in with your account. Once you have done that, click on the Deactivate link next to the PC you are uninstalling Office 2013. Deactivating the PC will allow you to install Office 2013 on another PC.

After you have deactivated the PC, you can open Control Panel -> Programs -> Uninstall a program and look for an entry named “Microsoft Office 365 Home Premium Preview” and click on the “Uninstall” button.

Once you have done that, a new dialog will pop up asking you whether you want to really uninstall the product. Click on the “Uninstall” button in that dialog to perform the uninstallation.

After the uninstallation has been complete, you can check if your older Office products work or run the Repair tool accompanying that product to fix the errors.

If you are someone from the early era of mobile adopters, you might be familiar with the classic Snake game which came preloaded on Nokia mobiles starting in 1998.

I remember spending hours and hours playing the game on the cellphone beating records and scores alike. In the years that followed, there were several iterations and enhancements of the games and the mobile gaming market exploded with the introduction of games like Angry Birds and others. However, the classic version still remains favorite of many users.

If you are nostalgic about playing the Snake game on your mobile and don’t have it on your latest smartphone, you can relive those old days by playing a HTML5 version of the game online.

The classic version of the Snake game has been recreated in HTML5 using JavaScript and CSS. The game is not only fun, but also goes on to show the power of the next generation of HTML. If you are someone who is looking to relive those old memories, you can also play the Snake game online.

Have you played the Snake game on your mobile? If so, do let me know your thoughts on what you thought of the game back in the days.

Microsoft unveiled the latest version of Microsoft Office and the successor to Office 2010 yesterday named as Office 2013. Office 2013 is a refresh of the earlier version and has a metrofied UI, which is the future of Microsoft products including Windows 8.

Microsoft made the consumer preview version of Office 2013 available for downloads yesterday. However, the download is web-based and you will not have access to the installer at a later date.

If you are looking to download a version of Office 2013 to your desktop and use it to install the software on multiple PCs, you will find links for the direct downloads of Office 2013 below.

However, it looks like two of the major browsers including Firefox and Google Chrome are already working on supporting the SPDY/3 protocol. While the SPDY/3 protocol is restricted to Sandbox builds of Firefox. Google Chrome dev and canary build versions also support SPDY/3 through a switch in about:flags. The support for SPDY/3 is available on Windows, Linux, Mac OS X and Google Chrome OS.

The SPDY protocol is definitely a step towards the future of the web and with major browser support it could help speed up how we access content on the web. Right now, other major browser like Internet Explorer, Safari and Opera do not support SPDY, but hopefully they should do it in newer versions of their browser.